Another gun based on the AR 18 is the British SA80. Like this one, it was a good idea poorly executed. The difference is with the SA80, it was a government arsenal design and government arsenal designs must be accepted under all circumstances no matter how bad they are.

According to some, the graduate engineers, who Enfield couldn’t get to stay with them for more than 5 minutes, never took a day out a few miles down the road to Dagenham, to speak to Sterling’s guys, who were making real AR18s.

Ian,
there’s my vote for one of the worst guns ever; the British SA80. So embarrassingly bad that the British government closed “Handgunner” magazine down for saying it was crap, and why it was crap.

Also, if that was a high quality drywall screw, it would be a Deckmate brand screw. I know Deckmate screws, and that is not a Deckmate screw. It would have cost them .0000003 cents more than the screw they used.

Pro tip: try shooting videos and photographs against a darker background in the future. Any auto-adjusting camera is going to compensate for a bright background and turn smaller dark objects like guns completely black, obscuring detail. You can use a contrasting color to further create contrast depending on the finish of the gun: brown for a black finish, grey for a wood finish, etc.

At the risk of sounding like a naysaying Nancy, the AR-18 gets a bit more credit as a good design than I think it deserves.

In the chain of “things that tend to go wrong” it shares ammunition (probably the biggest thing that can go wrong, if of poor quality), magazines, feed geometry, bolt design (dictating extraction and ejection, as well as dwell time between bolt carrier movement and bolt rotation; in the AR-15 and AR-18 this period is virtually zero, which is undesirable), and bolt carrier over-travel with the AR-15.

I think the AR-15 is a decent rifle, reliability-wise, but the AR-18 is often touted as a vast improvement in reliability over the ‘-15, which is demonstrably false.

Ian Nice review as always. It is a shame that a company that is “The Arsenal of Freedom” and are “the best built firearms in the world” also “technology’s tip of the spear” doesn’t just stick to making sharp pointy objects. In all the years I have been following AR’s on the interwebs The name Vulcan, Hess or Blackthorn has been synonymous with the worst possible products and much derision to those who purchase them. In a close 2nd place would be Countersniper scopes.

I have an early ar 15 and after a thousand rounds no ftf fte, no jaming. It only likes brass. Other owners have told me this. Did I just get a good one along with friends or did they make then better at first. I know my resale value is poop but I want to keep it. I shoot winchester 556 62 grain.

Keep it cheap and simple, is my mantra.
That being said, the butt stock mating screws are too flimsy, the useless bolt release should have been removed entirely, and the barrel should have been secured with a screw through the trunnion.
Keep up the good work, Sir !